WHATS NEXT? June 7:30 PM EV Do People Want Your Sh*t? June 2:00 PM Humanities Theatre The Pebble Story: From Velocity to Kickstarter Glory velocity.uwaterloo.ca/events

Finding Your Customers Online

WHAT IS THE GOAL? Identify a problem worth solving Define the right MVP Test the business model

WHEN SHOULD YOU USE IT? Global customer base on Day One Customers expect to find your product online Fast iteration cycles

WHEN SHOULD YOU NOT USE IT? No idea who your customers are No clue where to find your potential customers No plans to sell product online Local service or product Brand is important but not polished

KEY STEPS 1.Determine name and identity 2.Build online presence 3.Drive traffic to your website

PICKING A NAME Spend time to get it right Set a deadline (2 weeks) Ideally meets these criteria: –Phonetic and Memorable –Three syllables or less –.com available –Descriptive Check social channels for availability

BUILD ONLINE PRESENCE Can you code?

CAN’T CODE? Unbounce or Launchrock –Free or paid version –Great landing page Optimizely –Landing pages and A/B testing –Great analytics HubSpot –Landing pages –Great SEO and social tools

CAN’T CODE? Wordpress –Most popular publishing platform –Easy to get started –No code required –Use templates ThemeForest is my recommendation

LOVE TO WRITE CODE? Don’t start from scratch –Use a template Host for cheap or free –Heroku – one free instance Setup ping to keep alive –Digital Ocean Cheap and completely configurable

LANDING PAGE GOAL Define next steps for customers Capture –Mailchimp or VerticalResponse Test payment –Homegrown or Celery

ITERATE First version == Worst version Hone your messaging Improve your graphics Consider A/B testing

DRIVE TRAFFIC - FREE Social Media –Friends and Family –Twitter, Facebook, Instagram, etc Popular websites –HackerNews, Reddit, etc Industry specific forums –StackExchange, Quora, etc

DRIVE TRAFFIC - PAID Paid Search –Google AdWords (free credit) Social Media – Facebook Ads (free credit) Paid Influencers –Instagram Strategy

QUESTIONS? FEEDBACK?

WHATS NEXT? June 7:30 PM EV Do People Want Your Sh*t? June 2:00 PM Humanities Theatre The Pebble Story: From Velocity to Kickstarter Glory velocity.uwaterloo.ca/events